


Deteriorate

by Hi_Sseongie



Series: The Tonight Project [2]
Category: Red Velvet (K-pop Band)
Genre: Angst, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-01
Updated: 2020-12-01
Packaged: 2021-03-09 23:01:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,178
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27814228
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hi_Sseongie/pseuds/Hi_Sseongie
Summary: Seungwan deteriorates under the weight of the voices in her head.
Series: The Tonight Project [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2002576
Kudos: 4





	Deteriorate

Pain is a drug.

Seungwan tangles in her fingers in her hair, knees pulled up against her chest and fighting off tears that want to spill down her cheeks. She’s not weak, she won’t cry, not after the thousandth time this has happened. She balls her hands in her hair and withdraws into herself further, a tiny, feeble ball sitting on the floor, back against her bed. Her thoughts claw at her mind, sinking into her and crawling out of the shadows where they lurk.

_ Nobody. A no one. You are so, so weak. A fool. What does the world gain from you being in it. _

“Stop!” Seungwan begs.

_ What have you done? Nothing. You don't deserve life. _

"Just go away!"

_ Fucked. Useless. Your own parents don't even want you. _

"Please," Seungwan chokes out. "Please just leave me alone!" 

Pain is a solution. An answer. It takes away the world and fills in the sounds that drag Seungwan towards the edge. Pain is an addiction and Seungwan is a willing user. 

  
  
  
  
  


Seungwan fidgets with the cuffs of her sweatshirt. The fabric likes to catch on the fresh scabs and tear them open, to stick to the beads of red that well up open gaps and turn to a sticky scab. It's a continuous punishment, picking and tearing open new reminders when she starts to get comfortable.

"Nervous for later?" Seulgi, Seungwans longest friend, asks as she sits down next to her on the low planter wall.

Seungwan drops her gaze to her hands that tug and pull and rub at the ends of her sweatshirt. "Oh, uh, ya. I guess." Seungwan shrugs.

_ They will never get it, they will leave. You're too much, too difficult, too far gone for them to care or try. They would never understand. _

Seungwans grip on her sleeve jerks at the voices that claw around her mind and pulls at the scabs. It tingles, so sudden that the pain is euphoric until it settles in and is replaced by pricks. Like little needles–there to assure she uncomfortable.

"Hey Seul?" Seungwan breaks the long silence. 

"Ya?" Seulgi looks at Seungwan.

Seungwan toys with her thoughts. Teetering on the verge of asking Seulgi a hypothetical, if only to confirm her fears. Does it ever get hard to think because your thoughts won't stop? What do you think of people who use pain as a drug? Do your parents ever get mad? "No, nevermind, it was nothing."

"Are you sure?"

"Ya!" Seungwan waves off Seulgi's questioning gaze with a smile.

_ You see? Weak, unable to even ask a silly little question. _

Seungwan closes her eyes and suppresses the thoughts, voices, that tease her, draw her along like a pet–submitted to their every whim.

* * *

It all becomes noise at some point. The emotions fade out as a numb indifference takes over from adaptation, adjustment maybe? Worse is the obliviousness of everyone around her. Their innocent inquiries into the bruises or cuts that are passed off as "I'm just clumsy" or "my cat." Seungwan resents it. Resents their ignorance, the way they don't see that she is struggling even when it's she, herself, that puts on a smile and buries the truth. Why don't they care? Don't they care? 

Joohyun, a senior, sits down at the small table along with her, Seulgi, Joy, and Katy. "Hey guys!" They reply with hellos and heys of their own, but Seungwan is silent. Distracted by thoughts and voices. "Are you okay Wendy?" 

"Huh?" Seungwan looks up from tracing the triangle mesh of the table top, "Oh, ya. Just thinking about projects due before break."

"Ugh, don't remind me!" Joy moans. "I was having an okay day today!" 

"That's because you're naturally gifted and in easy classes dumbass," Katy snaps back.

"Language, please?" Joohyun chides.

Seungwan lets the banter fade into the background as she gets lost in her head again. Thoughts upon thoughts that never stop, but she's pulled back by someone, Joohyun, sliding onto the bench next to her with a smile. "Here." She holds up a bag of chips, "I know they're your favorite, so you can have them."

_ It's fake, she doesn't actually care. It's pity, she pities you! _

"Thank you." Seungwan takes the chips with a tight-lipped smile. Joohyun doesn't move back to the other side and instead stays beside Seungwan leaned against her just enough to keep her distracted and out of her head. Does she know? Can she tell?

  
  
  
  
  


Maybe she could call it inconvenient. All these thoughts that fill her mind are inconvenient, in the way, distracting, and very much annoying. She starts to become impatient. Snappy at minor disruptions, frustrated with failed attempts, and short when with her friends. It was subtle, small at first, came in the form of distance or a reserved kind of removal. Then, as the holidays approached, and the last week of classes rolled around, it came to a head. 

"Seungwan, can we talk?" Seulgi corners her alone in the locker room after track practice on monday. 

"About what?" Seungwan snaps, not that she means to, but it happens that way and there's no turning back.

"T-that. You've been so, well, we're worried. You've been mean and Joohyun and I, we don't think it's fair to us." 

"Oh, so you're teaming up on me now? That's how this is going to be? What great fucking friends you are."

"That's not what this is at all!"

"It sure sounds like it! Where is Joohyun? Or is she too afraid to tell me that you are both tired of me now? Had your fun? Or did she send you to tell me because she has better things to be doing? Finally sending me off to be that nobody. Well you've got it! I'll fuck off." Seungwan turns around to slam her locker closed.

"What are you talking about!? We don't hate you! We just! We just think you've been a little mean!"

"Oh stop lying Seulgi, it so unbefitting of someone so fucking pure and innocent."

"Seungwan!" Seulgi gasps. "Why are you acting like-"

"Like what?" Seungwan steps over the bench and strides towards Seulgi. "Like what Seul? Go on, say it."

Seulgi whimpers under Seungwan. "L- like someone else? I- I miss my friend." 

Seungwan huffs, "Someone else. Wow, well Seul, maybe this is just who I am. A fucked up asshole and you only just realized. I'll get out of your lives, no need to ask." She walks back to snatch up her backpack and breezes past a stunned Seulgi. Her steps are sure and gaze hardened all the way back to her house. 

_ So the charade is up. They finally know the real you. A freak. A demon. A no good. They revealed the lie and exposed you for the fuck up you are.  _

Is this who she is? What had she done? Seungwan tears apart her room in a blind rage, and breaks down in the middle of it–surrounded by the fruits of her anger. What did I do to be this way?

**Author's Note:**

> Just a lil spoiler of the larger project I have been working on. I say larger, but the real size is just the amount of time I have spent working on the right tone and style i want to use to get the emotions across correctly. :3


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